Estate Planning

Phishing for Probate

By Gregory Herman-Giddens

Today I received an email message that reads as follows:

    Good Day,

    My name is Sarah Brown. I work as an executive partner for the firm Mayer Brown Watford
    consulting,U.K. We are conducting an inquiry on
    behalf of Deutsche Bank, the German conglomerate. This inquiry involves a late client who                 shares your surname.
    1. Are you aware of any relative/relation who's last contact address was Brussels, Belgium?
    2. Who shares a similar name?
    3. Whose date of birth on file was 27/07/1932?
    Thank you for your co-operation and best regards,

    Sincerely,
    Mrs. Sarah Brown.
    mailmayerbrownwatford@googlemail.com

This is obviously a ploy designed to appeal to greedy folks who might provide false information in order to try to collect an "inheritance."  Notice how the writer doesn't even say what the name is?  And the email address doesn't have a company URL? I'm sure that if one were to respond, "Mrs. Brown" would require a "documentation" or similar fee to be paid up front before the inheritance can be received. Don't fall for it!

Full post as published by North Carolina Estate Planning Blog on July 28, 2008 (boomark / email).